Part 6: Selections from Three Orthodox Christian Priests from Latvia

Our 6th installment from ‘Three Orthodox Christian Priests in Latvia’ finishes up Fr Nikolajs Vieglais’ story, discussing his music and publishing work and his family as it was at the time of the interview (circa 1990). Next week we will meet another well known DOW priest who also began his ministry in Latvia — Fr George Benigsen!

Music and Publishing

Q: Part of your duties in Cesis, Latvia, after you finished the seminary was as a choir director. Can you tell something about your interest in music?

NV: At that church the parish was mixed: Latvian and Russian. And I noticed that we had no Latvian music. Somewhere the Liturgy and Vigil for Sundays had been printed, but it was printed for wide harmony [sings: do so me do]. It had been printed maybe sixty years before. But for church feast days, music was not yet available. I wanted to do something about that. But of course I had no special education in music in the seminary. I knew how to sing and how to give the tones, but it was not enough to publish something. In the meantime they opened the music school in Cesis. I entered in the singing class. It was singing, plus piano or another instrument. But each student had to study music theory. I chose singing and theory. And so, little by little, I started to understand that I could do something with music. Especially if I had the Russian samples, I could make them in Latvian. But how to print it? I had no money. But in the city hall there was a special polygraph. You had to write with a special ink, then put a special staff, put it here [motions with his hands], and then reprint a negative. And then we copied it on paper. It was in the city hall. I understood that I could do something this way to get music printed. Maybe the polygraph was not meant for reproducing music, but I figured out a way to use it for this purpose. That was the last year in the city hall in Cesis. And my idea then was to print in Latvian just to make good copies for the choir, not to publish. But there I got an idea of how I could do it in the future.
And that year [1934] I was appointed in Riga. Of course, the first year I couldn’t do anything, because my apartment was not free because of a deacon who was sick, whose apartment was supposed to go to me. He lived at that apartment, and someone took care of him. Fr. John Janson gave me one room in his apartment and I lived there. Of course I couldn’t do anything with printing there. Little by little the apartment was free, and so I moved there, and then I bought a polygraph for printing.

Q: You bought one yourself?

NV: I bought it myself. In Riga my condition was satisfactory, with a regular salary and many special services, panikhidas, and molebens.

Q: Where did you buy the polygraph?

NV: Just in the store.

Q: How much did it cost?

NV: It was maybe a half month’s salary. My wife started to work as a teacher also, and so I could afford it. And there’s a special ink for making originals. And then I started to print.

Q: Until the 1940s you were busy with many different activities, teaching religion 30 hours a week, and serving at the missionary church. What specifically did you publish?

NV: I started to publish in Riga in 1935. It was just some music pieces that were used in the convent but were not used in parishes. I wanted to make it more popular. It started with that. Then I tried to publish some kind of magazine in the Latvian language. But there was already one printed somewhere in the country and distributed. Therefore I sent music supplements to that Latvian magazine.

Q: What was the name of the magazine?

NV: It was in Latvian Ticiba un Dzive, or ‘Faith and Life.’

Q: Did Metropolitan Augustin encourage you with your printing and musical interests?

NV: Yes, he helped me, of course. But in Augustin’s time, they printed this service book for priests. It was I suppose the only issue from the central organization, but mostly private. Of course everything was stopped in 1940 when the communists occupied.

Q: When you were still in Riga, and you had your printing polygraph that you bought, did the church have one that they used, or was yours the only one that was used for this purpose?

NV: It was my private property.

Q: Did the church also print things?

NV: One other priest whose church was in the center of Riga, close to the cathedral, printed by himself. It was books for schools.

Q: Educational materials?

NV: Yes. Then another priest printed, but he passed away very suddenly. But he printed in Latvian. I reprinted from those later in Latvia. But the central organization, the synod, I suppose, had the means to print — money or something —, but maybe they didn’t have a specialist who could do it, so mostly it was done privately.

Q: When the communists occupied Latvia, did they demand that you give up your printing supplies?

NV: They didn’t ask me personally, but I was supposed to turn over my printing supplies to them. But I didn’t. I had there my paper board. [I wasn’t too concerned about keeping my supplies] because after the occupation the bishop came, and for the first half year the Soviets didn’t interfere.

Q: The Soviets invaded in July 1940?

NV: The Soviet army invaded in 1939, but only the ports and harbors. They decided with their army that they wouldn’t interfere in the government until June of the next year. Before that they occupied. But in the meantime I tried to get more paper.

Q: You thought that there would be a time of shortage?

NV: Yes. And I had a lot of paper. If they would have come to the church, I would have been sent to Siberia.

Q: Where did you keep the paper?

NV: I had a storage room in my apartment. One day three men came. I was printing. Printing! My hands had ink. They said, ‘We must check your electric bill.’ They asked to check around. I was not printing there. So they looked at one area, then at my work table, and they noticed an electric bill. ‘Is this the electric bill? We don’t need to see anything else.’

Q: Were they in uniform?

NV: No.

Q: But you knew they were some kind of —

NV: Sure! Because they heard. You cannot hide the fact that somebody is printing. They didn’t know if you printed today or yesterday, but if I printed, for sure I would have some leftovers from printing. And they came.

Q: Why didn’t they push?

NV: They were wise. They knew how to lie, how to hide themselves. They didn’t try, because they were Latvian people and they didn’t agree with the Russians. Of course, they had to work with them, but in those times they didn’t want to be very open about everything. They sent them to my house. They could go around and see. When they asked about the electricity, they wanted to tell me that they had to search. They had a loophole so that they could leave without doing this.

It is very difficult to explain, but in those times you could not do anything because you didn’t know if they liked the government or not. You could not talk like we are talking right now. Everyone tried to be within himself. To go and buy something in the store, in the line you just had one question: ‘Shto dayut?’ or ‘What are they giving?’ What could you buy there? It could be bread, apples or potatoes, no meat, no butter, but ‘Shto dayut?’ was all.

Q: If you couldn’t be open in most places, how did you talk with people? How did you know who might be informants? Did you talk to people privately?

NV: You didn’t know. Even your best friends could be informants. Such was the case with one young man in the Russian Student Movement. He was arrested and told he would be sent to Siberia or something. But the next day they were talking, ‘We will let you go, but you have to be an informant.’ Everything that we did, the communists would know. ‘You should give him a ride and give us this information.’ He agreed. I don’t know if he informed them of everything, but such was the case. But because they wanted to know what he did in this particular house, they had to arrest him, but there had to be some kind of reason.

Q: Even with your closest friends, you had to be careful.

NV: Very careful. Then I started to print different booklets, especially when the war started, because after the communists came all of the publishers were liquidated. And then I tried to do something in my home. Before the communists came I got the polygraph to print church music. And I did it until the last month of the communist government, June 1941.
When the Germans came they allowed me to print Russian booklets. And special booklets were needed in the mission in Pskov. I started with a molitvennik (prayer book), then different kinds of akathist hymns, then leaflets of religious articles. It was printed in a printing house, not in my house. I was too busy to print in my house because I printed very much in those times. Everything was sent to the Pskov mission and of course to the Latvian, Estonian, and Lithuanian Russian parishes.

Q: Who wrote those leaflets?

NV: There was a professor from the Kiev Academy who wrote mostly. He was in Latvia during the war.

Q: What was his name?

NV: Chetverikov. He wrote many such articles. Then some priests, the priest Legkij for example, and other priests, such as Perehvalsky. I can’t remember all the names. That was during the German occupation. When we went to Czechoslovakia, I was not able to print anything. We were there only one year and very soon the communists occupied Czechoslovakia. I just kept those booklets. I took a couple of copies from everything I printed in Latvia to those refugee camps.
And then we went to Prague and to another city in Czechoslovakia, Pilsen, then to Amberg in Bavaria. In Bavaria I started to think about publishing. But we were there only one year. I started to organize those materials I had for printing later. But we had to organize parish life there in the camp, organize a church, find out how to get icons, bake prosphoras, get wine, and so on. In Amberg we couldn’t get wine. We went to Nürenberg to get wine. We were busy with the church and then started visiting other parishes, other camps with the Tikhvin icon. So it was Amberg, then Hersbruck.
In Hersbruck we stayed from the end of 1946 until the middle of 1949. Then I started to print. Of course, how? We couldn’t get paper because it was forbidden for use by the local government. After the war they kept it only for special purposes and therefore I couldn’t use the German printing houses because they couldn’t supply me with paper. But I got another allowance from the American occupation forces. They gave me permission— not to me personally but to UNRRA, the United Nation Refugee Relief Organization. Later it was another name, IRA, but at first it was UNRRA. And I had to write on my booklets, ‘The paper is given by UNRRA.’

Q: How did you get that permission?

NV: From the local American authority. He was located in Hersbruck. And so I did it all the time I was there. At first I just republished by offset, but for the books that were printed, I made aluminum plates. And from the plates they printed the books. [takes out an example] This book, for example, was printed in Riga and copied [in Germany]. But in Hersbruck in 1946 I even included music in this and everything. [reads from cover page] ‘Hersbruck; approved by UNRRA.’ The publisher’s name is in Russian and in German.

Q: And they gave you the paper and the facilities?

NV: No, it happened differently! The Germans found out that I would write such things here. Little by little they started to give me paper. But I had to give them cigarettes [laughs]. Of course I paid for the paper, but in addition I gave them cigarettes. They knew how to use one cigarette for a long time. They cut cigarettes in three pieces. In the morning they smoked one part, in the afternoon at dinner another, and in the evening the third part.

Q: American cigarettes?

NV: They were American. The Americans gave us cigarettes, but I didn’t smoke, and other priests in the camp didn’t smoke either, and so I could use them to get paper for publishing. It was in Hersbruck.

Q: When you had services in the camps, did the Orthodox people that you came across know the music by heart or did you sing yourselves?

NV: In the camps there were different people. There were intelligentsia, farmers, workers, different people. There were singers and readers. And in almost in every camp, of course, there were priests. In our camp there was a bishop and three priests. I was one of them, but I mostly used to be a choir director, because there was no choir director in our camp. There were singers, but no choir director. In Hersbruck most people lived in workers’ rooms for each German industry. But for clergy and doctors, they gave one house, like a guest house. In one room was the church, iconostas, everything. It was downstairs. And the kitchen was given to me for printing! I was very happy that I could print there.

Q: With the polygraph you bought in Riga?

NV: No, I left that in Riga. In Germany there were print houses. But I had typesetting letters. I made the setting, and they printed somewhere in the German print houses.

Q: Where did you get the letters for that?

NV: It was a very interesting thing. Metropolitan Vitaly, who is head of the Synodal Church here, was an archimandrite in the Hamburg camp. They started to print there. They used a very primitive printing press powered by foot [demonstrates]. I asked where I could get the letters. ‘Here is a special factory.’ He suggested how I could get it. Of course they needed cigarettes![laughs] Cigarettes you could get anywhere. The Americans gave us cigarettes, but we didn’t smoke, so we could use them for these letters. I ordered them and they sent me. Downstairs I have those letters. I brought them here even from Germany!

Q: So you found a way to trade cigarettes for the letters?

NV: Cigarettes! We had to pay money too, of course.

Q: What did you print in the camps?

NV: The Liturgy, and then the same books that were originally printed in Riga were reprinted in Germany. The same books were reprinted in Pennsylvania and also here [in Berkeley]! At those times I printed parallel music with the polygraph.

Q: In which language did you print?

NV: In Slavonic. I kept this book from Russia, from Saratov, but I had no opportunity to reprint it in Riga, because the war started, and so on. I kept it hoping that some day I could print it. After the war, in the refugee camps, I printed the Slavonic Liturgy. I kept a copy of that and brought it from Saratov to Latvia, from Latvia to Czechoslovakia, Czechoslovakia to Germany, and in Germany I reprinted it.

Q: What is that book?

NV: Church services for the year, mostly holidays, not weekdays, but holidays. Different prayers: morning, Matins, Vigil, Liturgy and the eight tones. It’s in Slavonic. I printed it in Germany, in Hersbruck, 1947. Permission was given by UNRRA. [reads from title page of book] But in Germany, we needed to have paper. Without paper, you cannot print. It was just after the war, so I couldn’t get paper. Then I explained to the printers that I was living in the camp, and they responded. I had the chance to get paper! I brought my original and they printed it. In many books there it is written, because it was 1947. I started printing in 1945, but the paper was very poor. The next issue I printed again in the same printing house in Germany. I have one here [referring to example]. Real good paper.
When we went to the United States I took everything that was left over from printing, even the metal letters. We have them downstairs now. And when I came to New York they were surprised that such a DP — Displaced Person — had such big luggage. But where to put it? Happily because the Sunday school was not started in the cathedral in New York, they allowed me to put it in a Sunday school room. And later I took it to the basement of Christ the Savior church in New York. And it stayed there about a year. And I was a priest in Pennsylvania and got enough money to take it back from New York to Pennsylvania, and then I started to print in Pennsylvania. Again, I used those letters for setting, but they printed in a printing house in Lykens, Pennsylvania

Q: What did you publish in Pennsylvania?

NV: I published the magazine, Following the Steps of Christ, [repeats title in Russian], 16 pages only. It was in Russian. I made a suggestion to the bishop to give permission to print something in English. They said, ‘No, print just Russian because in English we have another publisher. Print in Russian because we need Russian. There are many people from Europe and China who read in Russian.’ I printed that magazine, then the 12 gospels for Holy Thursday night, in Russian, and then some other booklets, like this [shows an example]. I should prepare a list, but now I can’t remember. But I stayed there only two years.
I was appointed here in Berkeley. Then again, my luggage! Again there was the problem of how to get it here! But one parishioner worked in the railroad station, and he arranged to bring it here by railroad. But when I came here, where to put it? I lived in the caretaker’s apartment. I had five children and we two. Seven people in only two rooms and the library. And then what to do? But the person who was chairman of the church committee, Mr. Nichols, had a basement in his house on Cedar Street in Berkeley. He told me to bring [the printing equipment] there. It was there for a year or so, and then the neighbor here on the corner, Mr. Trevino, has a two-story house. But the lower story was a basement. During the war they made it into an apartment, but it had a very low ceiling. They couldn’t use it after the war. During the war they used it because they did not have enough room. My children were friendly with his children, and so he allowed me to put everything in his lower apartment. But how long could I keep it there? I continued to print there the magazine, Following in the Steps of Christ, and then printed other booklets. But of course I couldn’t do too much because I had no printing press. Again I needed to bring the materials somewhere else to print. I had no car at that time. It was my first year in Berkeley. The same Mr. Nichols brought my settings to a printing house, and so in this way they printed that magazine.

Q: How often did you print the magazine?

NV: Once a month. But later I would be more busy with printing. I started printing here in my basement bi-monthly, and then every three months, or quarterly.

Q: Did your family help you?

NV: The children put together with a brochure [demonstrates with some papers] and stapled. They helped me, of course. But what to do with such boxes, some 20 boxes with literature! I got the addresses of the parishes here, a yearbook. I started to send the packages to different parishes, asking them to donate one dollar or two. They started to send me [donations], so little by little I could buy the printing press. But it was the manual kind powered by legs. Later one parishioner who was a technician attached an electric motor to it, and so the motor would make it work. [demonstrates how it worked] It was okay. Of course it was a very busy time, but I could do it. But I worked up to 1979. In 1979 the bishop who gave me the blessing to print here, Bishop John of San Francisco, retired, and he supplied me with most of the material. I understood that he couldn’t help me any more, and I stopped printing.

Q: And nobody continued that magazine?

NV: That magazine? No.

Q: How many subscribers did you have?

NV: I printed at first 5,000! I sent 20 copies to each parish. They either sold them or didn’t sell them at their church, but they sent a couple of dollars. But I understood that it was too much work, because to print they needed 2,000. We printed 2,000 up to the very end.

Q: When Bishop Shahovskoy was in Brooklyn when you came here to this country, did he give you his blessing and support for this work? You said that he also contributed much of the material.

NV: No, when he was in Brooklyn I was not under him, but when he was transferred to San Francisco and I in Berkeley, then I was. He gave material. Many of them were those speeches for Voice of America. He was involved some 35 years with that. Even I worked [for the Voice of America] in Latvia for some 15 years. But only twice a year broadcasting church services for Christmas and one Sunday each year. For example, one year I could take the first Sunday, the next year the second or fifth Sunday, my choice, but Christmas every year.

Q: What year did Bishop John come to the West Coast?

NV: When I came here he was already here. It was 1951, 1950 maybe. Because Metropolitan Theophilus passed away. Bishop Leonty was in Chicago, but he was elected metropolitan. Bishop John Shahovskoy was appointed to San Francisco and Bishop John Garklavs to Chicago. For a short time Metropolitan Leonty gave me a blessing, then Bishop John wrote that it was his duty to give me a blessing because I was in his diocese.

Closing Words

Q: Fr. Nikolajs, I remember meeting your wife, Matushka Natalija. She passed away in what year?

NV: 1982.

Q: Can you tell something about what each of your children has done or is doing now and where they live?

NV: My oldest daughter died, Natalija. She passed away some four months after her mother’s death. She worked in San Francisco in a government office. Marina was married to Alfredo Alva who passed away recently. At first he had a job in Hayward. In those times I could help him buy the house there in Hayward. They lived there for a while, and then he was transferred to San Rafael. He worked for Sears. They started to think about moving to that area. They bought a house in Sonoma County and started going to the Protection of the Holy Virgin Church in Santa Rosa. But Marina’s son Daniel wanted to be an altar boy, and it happened that the local parishioners had their own children, so Marina started to bring them to this church. And he started to read the Creed and the Lord’s Prayer. He wanted to be active. Since that time they started to come mostly to this church. If there was a special service there in Santa Rosa, they went there, even some places like St. Eugene’s, they went, and Fort Ross, and even San Francisco. Marina likes to be close to the church.
And then Alex, my son, was in the army in the Vietnam War. He became a helicopter pilot. Now he works for the FAA, the Federal Aviation Administration. He gave directions to airplanes as an aviation controller, but shortly before that he changed his position and started working at the airport as a meteorologist, and until now he’s doing that. He is married, and his wife is working part-time, and now they live in Castro Valley.
Then a daughter, Olga, who studied Russian language in San Francisco. She was a teacher in the Monterey Army school, and one of her students was an army officer who was learning Russian. And he married her. They live in Washington.
And the youngest is Tanya. She works in an office, insurance company, and her husband is in electronics. She has one child and lives in San Jose.
Those are my children. Marina has five children: Anthony, Nicholas, Veronica, Daniel, and Christina. Olga has two children: Jason and Matthew. Tanya has one son, Paul.

Q: Fr. Nikolajs, I want to thank you for allowing me to come here and ask you questions and for being so open about your life. I will treasure this very much.

NV: I am very happy. Maybe somebody will know about me when I will be out of this world, you know [laughs]. A cup of coffee?

Click for the other parts in the series:

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8